Thursday, December 9, 2010

Five years ago while painting in the woods, I had an encounter with a wolf. That creature's golden eyes pierced through my heart and opened up a much neglected wild place within. My life tore open in ways I could never have imagined prior to meeting with his feral gaze. I started to paint ferociously. My "safe" lovely watercolor landscapes could no longer contain the wild energy that I felt building within. I began to paint larger, then I changed mediums, first oil and now acrylics. I left behind any people, places or habits that could not support this new passionate energy surging up through my body and spilling out onto the canvas in a frighteningly violent manner. Several months into this explosion I was diagnosed with breast cancer and in between daily radiation treatments I would paint, paint, paint. I walked through the woods and started to experience the earth's body as my own. I recognized a deep connection that I had always understood intellectually but now I was feeling it inside my own body. This is now the place I paint from, that deep wilderness within. A wilderness that sings, and screams and howls with terror and beauty. Yesterday was one of those days in the studio where the earth's voice just came flooding through my body and bursting onto the canvas in all her textures, shapes and forms. I am in love with paint and all it teaches me about this bond with the earth, and that wolf keeps howling deep within.

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Everything is but revelation; there can only be re-velation. But revelation comes from the Spirit, and there is no knowledge of the Spirit.

It will soon be dusk, but for now the clouds are still clear, the pines are not yet darkened for the lake brightens them into transparency. And everything is green with a green that would be richer than if pulling all the organ stops in recital. It must be heart seated, very close to the Earth, arms crossed, eyes closed, pretending to sleep.

For it is not necessary to strut about like a conqueror and want to give a name to things, to everything; it is they who will tell you who they are, if you listen, yielding like a lover; for suddenly for you, in the untroubled peace of this forest of the North, the Earth has come to Thou, visible as an Angel that would perhaps be a woman, and in this apparition, this greatly green and thronging solitude, yes, the Angel too is robed in green, the green of dusk, of silence and of truth. Then there is in you all the sweetness that is present in the surrender to an embrace that triumphs over you.

Earth, Angel, Woman, all of this is one thing that I adore and that is present in the forest. Dusk on the lake; my Annunciation...

The Mystery of Holy Communion where you will be ushered in, when all the beings will be present, yes, you can only say it in the future. Because at each moment where you read in truth as not what is there before you, where you hear the Angel, and the Earth and Woman, then you receive Everything, Everything in your absolute poverty. But as soon as you have read and have received, as soon as you consider, as you want to understand, as you want to possess, to give a name and restrain, to explain and recover, ah! there is only a cipher, and your judgement is pronounced...

...you are the poor one, you are man; and he is God and you cannot know God, or the Angel, or the Earth, or Woman. You must be encountered, taken, known, that they may speak, otherwise you are alone...

Friday, October 15, 2010

Two of my paintings being exhibited at the environmental conference being held in Calgary, "Under Western SKies" http://www.skies.mtroyal.ca/ I have learned much from so many brilliant minds and hearts gathered together from around the world to share in how we can best protect the future plight of our ONE shared planet. Another beautiful example of our inextricably woven consciousness within and without.

Sunday, October 3, 2010

The exhibition looked great opening night...it is a satisfying feeling to have so many completed paintings given the space they need to breathe in a big beautiful room full of light, music and friends. The gallery was energized and flowing with the earth's magnetic energy from within and without. My dear friend and spoken word artist, Moe Clark, performed a beautiful sound meditation allowing each viewer to take a journey into the painting through sound, a remarkable way to connect with and enter into the work. I would like to continue working with this form of collaboration between the visual and sound, allowing for a deeper experience of each.

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

Autumn, excessive in her exuberant expressions of color! Color that screams in ecstatic bursts all around me. I am dangerous on the road, constantly swerving in every direction as wanton displays of crimson surprise me around every corner. Exquisitely sensuous, autumn tumbles into robust colors that smell of earth and eros, nature drops her green mantle of modesty and reveals all her hidden passions in one last visual explosion before the silence of winter descends. I can almost hear the colors roaring like fire around me as I walk through the flaming maple forests of the Laurentian mountains. This is the season that fills me with a passionate lust for life and fills me with a burning desire to paint, paint, paint!

Thursday, August 5, 2010

Walt Pascoe (@waltpascoe) came up north to Mont-Tremblant to visit our Art Barn and left his beautiful energy behind as a gift in the forest behind the barn. He quietly created this cool "earth spiral" out in the woods.

He began with the twigs in the centre and slowly spiraled outward with mounds of pine needles...he continued with larger twigs and sticks arranged around the spiral as rays of energy shooting outwards!

A few weeks and several storms have started to fill in the path but you can still see the outline, I love the morning shadows of the pine trees falling horizontally over the spiral! Difficult to photograph but this is taken from above. The photos do not begin to communicate the effect that this has on the whole forest! It is profoundly energizing and peaceful at the same time. I have eaten my lunch there, cried with my daughter and laughed with friends. I have sat with great stillness beside it and felt Walt's energy emanating from it, just as from the painting of his that lives in my Montreal apt. Now the expansion begins. This structure of Walt's led to one of the sculptor's at the barn, Luis Paniagua, cutting several dead pines and creating this piece the next day:

Then Bruno Dufour, another sculptor from the barn was inspired to create his own piece, "Earth to Earth" beside the Earth Spiral. Bruno dug and sculpted earth all day. The photos definitely don't capture the mystic silence that surrounds this beautiful negative/positive rendition of a figure in the fetal position. The trees seems to become even more alive as these artworks are created within their sacred presence.

Finally today, I added my small contribution to all the delicious energy swirling throughout the forest. A hand-drawn tree on linen, an addition to the poetry walk that winds it's way through the forest with images and words: